How to Overcome Entrepreneurial Impostor Syndrome Case Study

Welcome back to our Case Study Series. In this episode, I am talking with Naomi. Her main concern is that she might be losing more than $300.000/year because of the Entrepreneurial Impostor Syndrome. This is something that so many people feel, and it is becoming more obvious every day. Let's solve the problems Naomi has, and I hope this will help some of you deal with yours.

Problems and challenges

When I need to pitch myself to new clients I get nervous – I am not as good as other entrepreneurs

If I have not done a task before and got perfect results I am scared I might not get the results they want, it will be my fault, they are angry with me, I have let them down, they are disappointed, I feel like a failure, ashamed, embarrassed

Belief that everyone is making stuff up all the time, don’t know all the answers, just trying their best

My work is so easily tracked so it is very obvious when my work is good or bad. Nervous that I will be judged by my clients that I am not good enough

Not confident enough in what I have to offer

Constant Worry and anxiety that maybe I am doing something wrong or I am not doing the best that my client could have gotten from someone else

Always thinking to myself “Why would they trust me?”

Effects/Results

Holds me back from pitching and outreach. Only doing 5-10% of what I could be doing

I could be making another $27k/month or $324k/year

Holds me back from being a superstar and changing the planet for the better helping a lot of people

Spend 20% more time on projects that I need to make them perfect in my own mind. This 288 hours per year of extra work I don’t need to be doing

Drains my energy – only 4/10 energy

Health: I make worse health decides when I feel this way

Eat 1-2 more dessert servings than usual

I work out more to contact my negative emotions and stress about this. For 2-3 hours.

I rely on others to give me confidence, so when they are not around I have a big problem

Interview transcript

Michael: Back to the case studies. I'm here with Naomi, and she has entrepreneurial impostor syndrome. This means when she's pitching to new clients she gets nervous. She thinks she's not as good as other entrepreneurs. Even if she gets the job, she feels she has to do perfect results and she worries a lot, and is scared she might not do as good as the client needs, and it'll be her fault and they'll get angry at her and fire her, and she'll feel she's let them down, that they're disappointed. That she's a failure. She'll be ashamed and embarrassed by all the mistakes she made. Of course, she never actually makes mistakes, but she's worried that would happen.

This is an enormous energy drain. She thinks, when we talked before this course … She calculated she could be easily losing more than $300,000 of income a year because she has this, and she doesn't reach out to people or talk to new people about it. She's always thinking to herself, “Why would they trust me?” Constant worry she's doing something wrong, that she's not doing the best for her client, they could be doing better work with someone else, and it totally gets in her way. Not only that, it affects her health and stress levels. She sometimes has to eat emergency desserts in order to feel better or go work out for two or three hours, just to feel okay to make that client call. So it takes up a lot of time and energy.